Gene-environment interaction analysis of school quality and educational inequality
Abstract We study to what extent schools increase or decrease environmental and genetic influences on educational performance. Building on behavioral genetics literature on gene-environment interactions and sociological literature on the compensating and amplifying effects of schools on inequality,...
| Main Authors: | , , |
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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Nature Portfolio
2024-03-01
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| Series: | npj Science of Learning |
| Online Access: | https://doi.org/10.1038/s41539-024-00225-x |
| _version_ | 1797275861936766976 |
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| author | Kim Stienstra Antonie Knigge Ineke Maas |
| author_facet | Kim Stienstra Antonie Knigge Ineke Maas |
| author_sort | Kim Stienstra |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | Abstract We study to what extent schools increase or decrease environmental and genetic influences on educational performance. Building on behavioral genetics literature on gene-environment interactions and sociological literature on the compensating and amplifying effects of schools on inequality, we investigate whether the role of genes and the shared environment is larger or smaller in higher-quality school environments. We apply twin models to Dutch administrative data on the educational performance of 18,384 same-sex and 11,050 opposite-sex twin pairs, enriched with data on the quality of primary schools. Our results show that school quality does not moderate genetic and shared-environmental influences on educational performance once the moderation by SES is considered. We find a gene-environment interplay for school SES: genetic variance decreases with increasing school SES. This school SES effect partly reflects parental SES influences. Yet, parental SES does not account for all the school SES moderation, suggesting that school-based processes play a role too. |
| first_indexed | 2024-03-07T15:19:08Z |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj.art-8fa36a8acc694c3aa74df7df5510f084 |
| institution | Directory Open Access Journal |
| issn | 2056-7936 |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-03-07T15:19:08Z |
| publishDate | 2024-03-01 |
| publisher | Nature Portfolio |
| record_format | Article |
| series | npj Science of Learning |
| spelling | doaj.art-8fa36a8acc694c3aa74df7df5510f0842024-03-05T17:44:14ZengNature Portfolionpj Science of Learning2056-79362024-03-019111410.1038/s41539-024-00225-xGene-environment interaction analysis of school quality and educational inequalityKim Stienstra0Antonie Knigge1Ineke Maas2Department of Sociology/ICS, Utrecht UniversityDepartment of Sociology/ICS, Utrecht UniversityDepartment of Sociology/ICS, Utrecht UniversityAbstract We study to what extent schools increase or decrease environmental and genetic influences on educational performance. Building on behavioral genetics literature on gene-environment interactions and sociological literature on the compensating and amplifying effects of schools on inequality, we investigate whether the role of genes and the shared environment is larger or smaller in higher-quality school environments. We apply twin models to Dutch administrative data on the educational performance of 18,384 same-sex and 11,050 opposite-sex twin pairs, enriched with data on the quality of primary schools. Our results show that school quality does not moderate genetic and shared-environmental influences on educational performance once the moderation by SES is considered. We find a gene-environment interplay for school SES: genetic variance decreases with increasing school SES. This school SES effect partly reflects parental SES influences. Yet, parental SES does not account for all the school SES moderation, suggesting that school-based processes play a role too.https://doi.org/10.1038/s41539-024-00225-x |
| spellingShingle | Kim Stienstra Antonie Knigge Ineke Maas Gene-environment interaction analysis of school quality and educational inequality npj Science of Learning |
| title | Gene-environment interaction analysis of school quality and educational inequality |
| title_full | Gene-environment interaction analysis of school quality and educational inequality |
| title_fullStr | Gene-environment interaction analysis of school quality and educational inequality |
| title_full_unstemmed | Gene-environment interaction analysis of school quality and educational inequality |
| title_short | Gene-environment interaction analysis of school quality and educational inequality |
| title_sort | gene environment interaction analysis of school quality and educational inequality |
| url | https://doi.org/10.1038/s41539-024-00225-x |
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